LITMIR.BIZ

      Chapter I

      I

       Table of Contents

      WILLIAM KENT mechanically accepted the letter which the desk clerk clerk handed him. Some unpaid bill that he had left behind him in Manila, perhaps; but no—the letter was from French Indo-China, and was postmarked "Hué." It was addressed to "M. William Kent, Grand Hôtel de l'Europe, Singapore."

      "Who the devil is writing me from Indo-China?" thought Kent.

      He was about to tear at the envelope when he heard his name spoken.

      "Mr. Kent?"

      He turned. A singularly handsome man stood at his elbow—a man whom he had met at the Cricket Club on the previous day. He could not remember the name, but the other caught his hesitation and laughed gaily.

      "Paléologue—a name to trip the British tongue, eh? Pardon me—I was seeking a fourth at bridge, if you would care to join us. Undoubtedly you are the William Kent who writes books upon ethnology and kindred sciences? I have read some of them. The honor of meeting you, sir, is impressive."

      Paléologue bowed. Kent could not grasp the man at all. This air of debonair gaiety left him in doubt whether the stranger was jesting or not. Scientific books! The thought made Kent chuckle to himself.

      "Bridge, eh?" he returned. "Thanks very much—yes, I'd be glad to sit in for an hour."

      He turned and accompanied Paléologue, thrusting the unopened letter into his pocket.

      No one, seeing William Kent thus lodged at the finest hotel in Singapore, wearing purple and fine linen, surrounded by every luxury, and not working a stroke, would have guessed how nearly desperate was the American. Only a year before he had had a flourishing export business of his own in Manila. A crooked financier had ruined him; a selfish woman had embittered him.

      He wandered to Singapore, after vainly attempting to settle down or get back into business, and here he went into rubber speculation with what little money he had left. This was toward the end of 1920, when the rubber panic struck Malaya like a whirlwind, and Kent went down at the first crash.

      Having insight, business acumen, and a small stake left, he went "short" on the chance that still worse would come. It came. Kent emerged with a thousand dollars in cash, a distaste for Singapore and rubber, and an urge to wander somewhere else.

      At this juncture came the letter from Hué and Michael Paléologue. Both were agents of fate.

      Kent followed his new friend to one of the terraces overlooking St. Andrew's Road and Raffles Plain. Out beyond, over Connaught Drive, with its sweeping trees and croquet-wire fencing, glittered the waters of the harbor. Here, at a table in a pleasant corner, he was introduced to two other men. One of them was a Frenchman—or rather a Provençal—Davignan by name. An immense fat fellow this, with cherubic, smiling features, trim black mustache and napoleon; a cordial and impressive person. The other was a silent Englishman.

      Paléologue introduced Kent as the famous ethnologist, and from the man's gay manner Kent let the joke pass. Boston had endowed him with a broad "a" which often made men think him English.

      From the very start, Kent's cards were abominable, his luck worse. The stakes were high enough to surprise him, but he was game. He passed into the reckless, defiant mood of the man who gambles.

      Aside from this, he was interested in the two men, Paléologue and Davignan. They seemed to be engaged in a merry game of war under the surface—a gay defiance, a mutual challenge; yet outwardly they were very friendly.

      Between the cards, the table talk conveyed much information to Kent. He discovered that this Paléologue was some sort of nobleman; just what, he could not ascertain. The man spoke all languages and appeared to be a cosmopolitan. He and Davignan were both bound north to French Indo-China. The fat Provençal said very little about himself, however, except when Kent made some remark about the beauty of the scene before them.

      "Ah!" Davignan looked wistfully over the brilliant scene. "You think this beautiful? You should see the sweet saladelles, the green slopes of the Étang de Vaccarès, the flamingoes with their pink wings—"

      "Bah!" Michael Paléologue snapped his fingers gaily. "You and your salt desert of Provence! Nothing in that country but ruined cities and false legends and wild cattle, my countrymen of Mistral! You lack imagination."

      Kent impulsively spoke up, moved by something he saw in the eyes of the fat Davignan.

      "Imagination! You have too much of it, Paléologue. If I had as much as you have—"

      He paused. The bold, dark eyes of Paléologue swept him mockingly.

      "Yes?" came the smooth voice. "And what would you do then?"

      Kent chuckled.

      "Faith, I'd get rich in a hurry!"

      "Tell me how, and I will accomplish it," retorted Paléologue, a thrust of rather disagreeable challenge in his voice. "I should like to be rich—in a hurry!"

      "Easily told!" Kent shrugged. "I'd go up north and rob Hué of the treasure of the Anamese kings. That would be a man's job!"

      The eyes of Paléologue danced upon him.

      "I accept the challenge," was the prompt retort. "I will steal this treasure!"

      Davignan uttered a rumble of laughter.

      "Why do you laugh, if you please?" queried Paléologue coldly.

      "For two reasons." Davignan wiped mirthful tears from his fat jowl. "For two reasons, both most excellent ones. The first, that this treasure is well guarded—by men and by walls, you conceive. Only most distinguished visitors can obtain permits to view it."

      "Well, am I not distinguished?" Paléologue twisted his blond mustache with a grand air. "True, I owe a bar sinister to one of my ancestors, but otherwise—I am a Paléologue. And the second reason, my honest friend?"

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